Hackley Stadium Celebrating Century as Monument to Community Dedication, Football Glory
By
Ron Pesch
MHSAA historian
September 4, 2026
Mounted on the brick wall of Hackley Stadium, facing Sanford Street in Muskegon, is a bronze plaque. In raised type, it details a successful “GoFundMe” effort – 1920s style.
The approach was a bit different then, but the fundraising efforts were successful and created an iconic landmark that still stands – now ready to celebrate its 100th year.
Seated, rectangularly, in the middle of a residential neighborhood, directly behind the high school, the site itself has served as home to Muskegon High School’s football team for 120 years. The sport dates to 1895 at MHS.
The wooded lot was gifted in 1902 by Muskegon’s greatest benefactor – lumber baron Charles H. Hackley – to the Board of Education. Hackley desired the space to be developed into an athletic field and playground for use by the school and area youth.
Quickly dubbed Hackley Field, it took four years before administration cleared trees from the lot. Initial plans for the parcel, laid out by a former coach and director of athletics, envisioned a site that would accommodate multiple sports, including a gridiron at the center of the property, surrounded by a track, with tennis courts placed at the site’s four corners.
Bob Zuppke – hired in August 1906 as the school’s newest coach and director – learned that the school board was ready to act on the design. He immediately spotted the planned layout showed a football field of just 50 yards. Recognizing the site could accommodate a full-sized gridiron, his redesign reduced the number of tennis courts to three and pushed them to one end of the site. He expanded the gridiron to regulation size and surrounded it with a 1/5-mile cinder track. His plan included space for a baseball diamond within the gridiron. An extensive wooden grandstand along the northeast side of the site would stretch the length of the football field to handle growing crowds at sporting events.
Zuppke’s modifications were promptly accepted, and Hackley Field was ready in mid-May 1907 for an initial track meet with Muskegon’s biggest rival, Grand Rapids Central. That fall, Muskegon played seven consecutive football home games at the new location. Recognizing the financial value of the annual clash with Central, that contest was moved to the last game of the year and staged on Thanksgiving Day. Crowds soared in size.
Dropping just a single game each season during his four years in town, Zuppke built Muskegon into a football powerhouse before moving on to even greater gridiron success over three years at Oak Park High School in Illinois. In 1913, he was named head football coach at the University of Illinois, earning national titles in 1914, 1919, 1923 – with a team that featured three-time All-American Harold ‘Red’ Grange – and 1927. Zuppke retired following the 1941 season. During his 35-year prep and college career, he introduced numerous innovations that remain hallmarks of the game today.
Plans for a Cement Stadium
From a comfortable chair, stationed in his room at a retirement home in Kalamazoo, 85-year-old C. Leo Redmond, former coach at Muskegon, recalled the story behind the construction of Muskegon High School’s historic Hackley Stadium. The concrete structure, built in 1927, replaced greatly expanded wooden stands (tennis courts were never added) originally placed on the site by Zuppke’s design.
Born in 1900 in Kalamazoo, Redmond arrived at MHS in 1925. A recent graduate of Western State Normal School – today’s Western Michigan University – he wasn’t Muskegon’s first choice to replace his predecessor, the highly-successful J. Francis Jacks.
A 1912 graduate of Muskegon, Jacks had turned the team’s football games into a huge draw between 1920 and 1924. During the span, his teams earned three mythical state titles over five years and produced an array of talented athletes, including University of Michigan great Bennie Oosterbaan.
But in the spring of 1925, Jacks passed away unexpectedly. Gus Cohrs, another Muskegon alum, was experiencing success in basketball and football at Grand Haven High School. He’d accepted the Muskegon job to succeed Jacks, but an outcry by Grand Haven fans and an immediate pay raise kept him from moving.
Fortunately for all, Redmond’s teams went 7-1-2 in 1925, then repeated as Michigan’s mythical champion in 1926. Immediately after the completion of that season, however, the school faced its next challenge.
“We walked out to the bleachers at the football field and Joe Bicknell (the Hackley Manual Training School director and facility manager for athletics) pulled out his pocketknife,” said Redmond. “He then pushed the blade completely into one of the wooden beams supporting the bleachers and said, ‘They will fall down if they have to support another season.’ So, we started a fund drive for Hackley Field’s reconstruction by selling stadium bonds.”
Muskegon contacted The Osborn Engineering Company of Cleveland, Ohio, to discuss the task. Peter P. Evans, vice president of the firm, visited Muskegon to inspect possible sites. “Mr. Evans’ company planned and built Navin Field, Detroit, the Polo Grounds, New York, and is now building the new stadium for the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor,” noted the Muskegon Chronicle.
Visiting in December, Evans advised “it would be best if it could replace the present seating arrangements at Hackley Field,” noting “it would not be architecturally objectionable to anyone in the neighborhood nor spoil the landscape effects of the campus.”
Building a stadium made with cement had been pondered by Bicknell and administration as early as 1913, but cost – then estimated at $25,000 – was viewed as insurmountable.
It took until April 1927 for final approval of a plan, and Osborn Engineering was authorized to prepare specifications. Time was of the essence, as the existing bleachers were now condemned and needed to be removed and replaced by fall.
The design would include “two team rooms” and restrooms under the stands, with the project financed by sale of bonds. A total of 1,500 were issued, priced at $50, earning 4 percent interest. The structure would feature seating for 6,000, with a block of 1,100 seats located between the 35-yard lines reserved for bondholders. The $75,000 campaign launched the first week of May.
The district tapped into a young sales force to help execute the plan – the student body. The classes of '27, '28, '29 and '30 – over 2,000 strong – were asked to distribute pamphlets and sell bonds to the public.
Years later, Gont Miller remembered walking home with Bub Meier – both would serve as future captains of Big Reds football teams.
"Principal John Craig talked to us Thursday night after practice,” recalled Miller. “He said, 'We're going to ask you to get out and sell some bonds.'
The pair talked about their frustration at being assigned the unwanted task.
“Together, we decided we weren't going to do it. After I got home, I told my mother about the bonds.”
She reframed it for her son, highlighting the community that surrounded them.
"Boy, that will be easy,” she said. “After dinner, go on over and see Mr. Runzel across the street, and the Nelsons on the side of us. I'm sure they will be interested.
"Well, I guess she got me inspired. I went over and saw Mr. Runzel, and he bought four. And Lester Nelson bought three, and Otto Meeske bought six. Mr. Runzel said, 'Go down and see my son,' and I did, and he bought two. People really supported Big Red football. We sold all the bonds, and they built the stadium. It was quite an experience for a kid."
Construction contracts were awarded by June 1, and actual work on the site started on Wednesday, June 15. According to the files of Osborn Engineering, the concrete and brick structure itself was completed over just 24 days – July 20 to August 12. Final plumbing and electrical preparations were completed in time for the first game against Muskegon Heights on Saturday, September 17.
Dedication and the Birth of a Rivalry
"Impressive and colorful flag-raising ceremonies marked the dedication of the new stands," wrote Jimmy Henderson in the Muskegon Chronicle. "A massed assemblage of over 2,000 students who paraded on the field following the Heights and Muskegon high school bands, and close to 3,000 spectators in the stands stood at attention while the massed bands under the leadership of Ronald Hinchman played the national anthem, as the new flag was slowly raised to its position over the stadium."
The Big Reds posted a crushing 89-0 victory over the Heights and their new coach, Oscar E. "Okie" Johnson – a former teammate of Redmond’s at Western – in the season opener. It was the first of nine shutouts posted by Muskegon en route to a 10-0 campaign and another mythical state title. Outscoring opponents 445-6, the team remains among the greatest in school history.
Muskegon claimed a second-consecutive shutout over Johnson’s Tigers in 1928, this time 19-0, and finished the season with another state crown. In ’29, they again blanked the Tigers, but by just seven points. In 1930, Johnson’s squad tied Redmond’s Big Reds, 6-6, and established themselves as Muskegon’s chief rival. Come 1936, the game was moved to the season finale, replacing the matchup with Grand Rapids Central. Lights were added to Hackley in 1940, with most games shifted to Friday nights. Annual classic battles between the Big Reds and Tigers were all played at Hackley (until 1948) and still staged on Saturday afternoons (until 1953) to accommodate the massive crowds.
The 1945 season-ending contest between the schools – both undefeated – was a battle for the state title. A record crowd of 13,500 packed every square inch of the grounds. Heights opened a 7-0 lead early, but Muskegon responded with a touchdown midway through the second quarter. A missed extra point pinned the score at 7-6. It remained stuck there until an intense goal-line stand late in the fourth quarter would determine the game’s outcome. The Big Reds had advanced the ball to the Tigers’ 1 on second down. A charge at the center of the line on third down was stopped.
“The ball, three inches from the goal line when play started, still was an inch from the line when it was set down,” wrote Henderson, still covering the rivalry. “When (the defense) stopped the forward motion of (Muskegon’s quarterback), the air went dark with the applause of the Heights fans, and the groans of Muskegon’s.” The win capped the first of three consecutive state crowns won by the Tigers, and the loss was the first in 16 starts for the Big Reds, the defending state champion.
In 1946, Muskegon installed its first electronic scoreboard, retiring the one manually operated by the Boy Scouts. Redmond retired as coach following the season with a 156-29-13 record and seven state titles over 22 seasons. (His victory total remained tops in school history until recently surpassed by current head coach Shane Fairfield.) Most fittingly, the remarkable gridiron rivalry between coaches Redmond and Johnson ended dead even at 9-9-2.
Reduced revenue during the depression years forced default on bond payments. After a restructuring of obligations, a final payout distributed in 1950 to bondholders meant the stadium was now out of debt. That fall, $8,000 in repairs and waterproofing helped stabilize a structure starting to show wear and tear.
Coach Harry Potter – another Western teammate of Redmond’s, and his longtime assistant – took the reins in 1947 and guided the 1951 Big Reds to another gridiron state championship. That team featured future NFL quarterback Earl Morrall.
Over the years, Hackley Stadium has served the community with World War II events to sell war bonds, practice drill formations, events to honor local industries’ wartime outputs, and VFW Memorial Day gatherings. There have been countless halftime shows, marching band competitions, high school assemblies, and commencement exercises. It has hosted opera, concert performances, and music reviews. In 1951, evangelist Rev. Billy Graham and his music director Cliff Barrows visited. In 1957, a massive Water Follies show with a dive tank, stage, and swim tank – spanning 150 feet – filled Hackley Stadium, raising money for the local ‘Police and Fireman Benevolent Association’.
More than 10,000 fans packed the stands in the fall of 1971 to watch another pair of unbeatens as the Big Reds topped Traverse City on their way to another state championship. Members of the Lake Michigan Athletic Conference, the Trojans became firmly established as new primary rivals on Muskegon’s annual slate.
After four uncharacteristic down years on the gridiron during the early 1980s, huge crowds returned to pack Hackley’s stands beginning in 1985, especially during Muskegon’s march to MHSAA playoff titles in 1986 and 1989.
Continued maintenance over the years ensured the stadium’s survival. In 1996, extensive renovations and rejuvenation of the concrete stadium ensured the safekeeping of the ‘Home of the Big Reds’. Concession stands were moved from beneath the seating to structures at the north and south ends of the stadium. Modern requirements meant removal of the track that once surrounded Hackley to expand the concourse that leads to seating. But proximity and sight lines to the playing surface – always a feature of Hackley for fans – were not sacrificed.
The Tunnel
Terry Foster, writing for the Detroit News, visited the stadium as part of his “Terry’s Tour” in 2006. Kicking off a series of articles where he visited high school football games across the state, Foster’s opening paragraphs focused on another unique feature of the stadium.
Postgame, the Big Red Band ends home game festivities by marching – shoulder-to-shoulder, students aligned three-or-four-or-five across, with instruments swinging up-and-down and side-to-side, beneath the stands.
“Fans lined both sides of the cramped corridor as the band paraded through the narrow human tunnel …
“‘Ok. You got to hang tight against the wall,’ Muskegon head coach Tony Annese told Foster. … You will get hit if you are not careful.’ … Like Annese, they wanted to feel the booming drums vibrate off the concrete walls as the band marched underneath the stadium. …
“The march that eventually took the musicians (down Sanford Street) to their music room has been going on for decades. So has winning football.”
A new video scoreboard was installed in 2015. Field turf replaced Hackley Field’s natural grass in 2020. Also added was a brick fence similar in placement to one that surrounded the site back in 1914 and was removed in phases between 1927 and 1946.
Muskegon continues to lead the state in all-time football victories, earning additional MHSAA titles in 2004, 2006, 2008, 2017 and 2023. Many feel that rich tradition, combined with the classic backdrop of Hackley Stadium packed with alumni and passionate football fans, has played a huge role in those wins.
For the Big Reds, Hackley has always been more than brick, concrete, and rebar.
PHOTOS (Top) Muskegon takes on Grandville in 2015 at Hackley Stadium in what would end as the program’s 800th victory. (2) The proposed stadium plan from 1906 shows the football field, baseball diamond, track and tennis courts among other proposed features to the new athletic field. (3) Muskegon takes on Grand Rapids Central in 1922. (4) Osborn Engineering works on the renovated stadium during the summer of 1927. (5) The stands are filled for a game in 1942. (6) This display includes a photo of the 1928 state championship team and brochure for stadium bonds. (Top photo by Tim Reilly. Other photos collected by Ron Pesch.)
Farewell Silverdome; Our Memories Live On
By
Ron Pesch
MHSAA historian
November 28, 2017
Farewell Pontiac Silverdome.
In early December, more than 15 years after the Detroit Lions played their last game beneath its air-supported Teflon-paneled roof, the “Dome” will take a last breath and then depart.
Finally.
The last few years have been cruel to the stadium that was once a gem and the home of dreams.
The Lions arrived at the newly opened “Pontiac Metropolitan Stadium” (or “Ponmet” as it was called by enthusiasts of the new structure) in August 1975. It was renamed “Pontiac Stadium” later in the year by the city council, and in October of 1976 the Pontiac council again re-christened the building as the “Pontiac Silverdome.”
“We feel the new name better conveys the image of our facility,” said Charles McSwigan, Jr., stadium executive director, at the time. “It certainly lets everyone around the country know we have a modern year-round domed stadium.”
The move was primarily marketing motivated. “The other three giants, Super, Astro and King, get all the publicity,” added McSwigan, further explaining the change. “Promoters call them, but they don’t even come near us.”
Launched in 1975, the MHSAA football championship games were played outdoors at college stadiums that first year on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. While deemed a success, the games were played at two different sites. That had presented challenges.
Following that first year, consideration was given to the new structure in Pontiac.
“There are some problems,” remarked Al Bush, MHSAA executive director, explaining the logistics of a possible move to the NFL stadium. “For instance, it would be difficult to play four games on the same day. We would have to start early in the morning, and the last game would have to start late at night.”
Competition for attendance with various events, including deer hunting season, and college football – especially the televised University of Michigan-Ohio State game – were factors to be considered. The high school football playoffs were still a new product without a tradition. Finances also were an area of worry. It was estimated that a crowd of between 20,000 and 25,000 would be needed to make the jump economically feasible.
So, it was with great caution and trepidation that the move was made indoors to Pontiac. Initially, the contract was for a single year. The games would be played on the Saturday following Thanksgiving. By all measures, to the delight of all involved, the 1976 championships were a huge success.
“The four state championship games, which were played in the Silverdome in two sessions on Saturday, drew a paid attendance of 29,423 fans,” said Associated Press writer Harry Atkins in a follow-up piece following the games, “bringing smiles of relief and joy to MHSAA Executive Director Al Bush and his assistant, Vern Norris. The attendance figure was almost double the number of fans who turned out last year in ice box-like weather at two sites – Western Michigan University and Central Michigan University.”
With that, a new contract was signed, and for 29 years the city of Pontiac served as home to the MHSAA 11-player football championships. “Goin’ to the Dome” soon became the goal of every high school in Michigan that offered the sport.
Following a 15-10 victory over the Dallas Cowboys in early January 2002, the Lions departed the Silverdome for Ford Field, located in downtown Detroit. The high school Finals stayed put for three more years before moving to Ford Field.
Twelve seasons after following the Lions from Pontiac to Detroit, countless memories and several MHSAA championship game records still stand from those years under the Dome.
Four championship games were played at the Silverdome to close each season from 1976-90. In 1991, the playoffs were expanded to eight classifications and the Finals expanded to eight games over a two-day showcase.
For many across Michigan, those 176 high school state title games were their first live exposure to the building many had only seen on television. For football fans, the MHSAA Finals provided an affordable and unique chance to visit the stadium and watch the game between the 20-yard-lines at ground level. An NFL game, concert, or in later years a Pistons basketball game at the Silverdome was far from an intimate experience for most. Seating 80,311, it was the largest stadium in the NFL until 1997.
For thousands of athletes and coaches, the playing surface was their first exposure to artificial turf. It was an honor to set foot on the field. After all, who didn’t want to run on the same canvas on which Lions legend Barry Sanders painted?
Who can forget the Mill Colemen-led comeback drive to title glory in the final minutes as Farmington Hills Harrison downed DeWitt for the Class B title in 1989, or “The Catch” by Muskegon Reeths-Puffer’s Stacy Starr that broke the hearts of Walled Lake Western players and fans in the final seconds in Class A in 1992? Who remembers the wild 91 points (and 883 yards in total offense) posted in Belding’s 50-41 victory over Detroit Country Day in Class B in 1994, when Belding trailed by 19 points at the half? The combined final score remains the record for most points tallied in a title game by two teams.
Farmington Hills Harrison and coach John Herrington won five consecutive finals in Pontiac (1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001), and 12 of their 13 MHSAA Finals titles at the Silverdome. A total of 12 of Detroit Catholic Central’s 17 trips to the Finals meant a bus ride to Pontiac.
One record performance set in the opening game of the 1976 championships still stands in the MHSAA championship record book. With the evolution of the game, it may never fall.
Despite the climate-controlled environment afforded by moving indoors, Crystal Falls Forest Park threw only three passes against Flint Holy Rosary in the Class D title game, completing one for a net -3 yards. By default, that total established a record for pass defense in a title game. It remains the zenith.
Forest Park had little need for the pass that day. The Trojans rolled up 234 rushing yards on 48 carries, including a 74-yard touchdown run off left tackle by all-state running back Marty Ball with 4:36 to play in the first quarter. Less than two minutes later, a fumble recovery by Forest Park’s Charlie Davis was returned 25 yards for a score, and the Trojans led, 14-0. Holy Rosary passed for 204 yards including an 18-yard pass from Ron Fray to Dan Lehoux in the second quarter, but couldn’t overcome that first quarter deficit, falling 14-6. A crowd of 14,879 attended the day’s first session, comprised of the Class D and Class A games.
Other long-standing record performances at the Dome still can be spotted in the record book.
Josh Wuerfel’s 46-yard field goal in the second quarter gave Traverse City a 10-0 halftime lead and aided the second-ranked Trojans’ 24-14 defeat of top-ranked Detroit Catholic Central in the 1988 Class A contest. The kick stood for 28 years as the title game record before finally being exceeded (twice!) at the 2016 championships played at Ford Field. Liam Putz of Grand Rapids West Catholic shattered the mark with a 47-yarder against Menominee in the Division 5 title game, before Ben Fee of Orchard Lake St. Mary’s topped the kick in the eighth game of the weekend. Fee’s 49-yard field goal late in the fourth quarter helped St. Mary’s down Muskegon 29-28 in the Division 3 thriller. The boot was his third field goal of the game. Combined with two extra points, he finished as the Eaglets’ top scorer.
Paul Gross of Jackson Lumen Christi established a new mark for extra points against Livonia Clarenceville in the 2001 Division 5 game, connecting accurately on all seven of his attempts. The record has been matched twice since the move to downtown Detroit.
Nick Williams’ 90-yard touchdown dash on Farmington Hills Harrison’s first play from scrimmage in the 1994 Class A game, a 17-13 victory over Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central, still tops the record book category for longest run play in a title game. An 89-yard TD run by Constantine’s Jim Schragg sits directly behind the Williams’ mark. Schragg rolled up 307 yards in a 34-13 win over Suttons Bay in the 2004 Division 6 game, during the final year at the Silverdome. His total established the pinnacle for rushing yards in a game.
Ravenna’s Benny Clark carried the ball 49 times (including 29 rushes in the second half) for 212 yards as the Bulldogs topped Morenci 30-14 in the 1996 Class C contest. The total, which exceeded the previous mark of 40 set by Dan Lato of Crystal Falls Forest Park in 1977, has yet to be matched or exceeded.
The fastest championship game passing touchdown came 15 seconds into the 2003 Division 5 Final, when Jackson Lumen Christi‘s Tyler Aldridge found wide-open Matt Russell on a reverse pass on the second play from scrimmage. The Titans defeated Muskegon Oakridge 23-0 for the title.
Quarterback Tony Koshar tossed a short pass to Jim Steinman, “who shed a tackler and managed to stay in bounds as he took off for the end zone on a 96-yard scoring play,” as Gobles grabbed a 31-22 upset victory over top-ranked Crystal Falls Forest Park in the 1984 Class D title game. The reception for the longest pass play lasted 24 years before it was finally topped in 2008.
Kirk Williams’ 15 pass receptions for DeWitt against East Grand Rapids in the 2002 Division 3 contest still stand the test of time, as does Brad Johnson’s 87-yard punt return for a touchdown for Schoolcraft against Frankfort in the 1988 Class D championship game.
The 1991 title games saw two defensive marks set, both on the same day. On Saturday, November 30, Rick Marcotte of Lake Linden-Hubbell scooped up a fumble and dashed 79 yards for a touchdown and a new Finals record versus Mendon in Class DD. Less than 16 hours earlier Nate Cierlak of Muskegon Catholic Central had set the mark with a 56-yard return for a TD against Harbor Beach. In that year’s Class CC Final against Negaunee, Jason Livengood of Battle Creek Pennfield set the one mark that statistically can never be topped when he returned a pick-six for 100 yards.
Eight punts by Muskegon’s Jason Crago in the Big Reds’ 16-13 victory over Detroit Martin Luther King in the 1989 Class A title game was unmatched until 2007, when Aaron Hudson of Blissfield equaled the total. On Saturday, Clarkston’s Jermaine Roemer also tied the record in the Division 1 Final.
Between 1976 and 2004, more than 1.5 million fans attended the games in Pontiac, with a peak of attendance of 71,156 in 1995.
Soon the site will be cleared, with plans for redevelopment. Not far down the road, The Palace of Auburn Hills, once home to the MHSAA Basketball Finals and longtime home to the MHSAA Individual Wrestling Finals, will be scrubbed from the earth. Along with them, the structural evidence of the home of countless accomplishments will disappear.
Change is constant, and time moves on. Still those achievements, and several others, live on in the pages of the MHSAA record book, in the memories of those who competed and the recollections of those who played witness.
Ron Pesch has taken an active role in researching the history of MHSAA events since 1985 and began writing for MHSAA Finals programs in 1986, adding additional features and "flashbacks" in 1992. He inherited the title of MHSAA historian from the late Dick Kishpaugh following the 1993-94 school year, and resides in Muskegon. Contact him at [email protected] with ideas for historical articles.
PHOTOS: (Top) Constantine and Suttons Bay played in the Division 6 Final at the Silverdome as part of the last weekend of MHSAA games in the building in 2004. (Top middle) The 1976 program welcomed Finals fans to the Dome for the first time. (Bottom middle) The author's children during a trip to the Silverdome before the Finals moved to Ford Field. (Below) The 1986 Finals ticket got fans into two games at the Silverdome for $4. (Photos courtesy of Ron Pesch and MHSAA files.)